Design Options (cont'd)

If you like the idea of adding more colors, you could use just one, or two. Every additional color and molding treatment adds time and money to the budget.

Often, one of the most important upgrades you can make to kitchen cabinetry is to install new pulls or knobs to the drawers and cabinets. Knobs are usually held in place by a single screw, and pulls by two screws. With careful shopping, you will be able to install new hardware using the existing holes.

As is always the case with Trading Spaces projects, time and budget constraints placed strict limits on what could be accomplished. In this kitchen, only the outsides of the cabinets were painted; even the insides of the doors and drawers were left white. You could take this a step or two further, by painting the entire door, for example, and maybe even painting the insides of the cabinets. Think twice, however, about painting the bottoms of shelves and drawers. Latex paint dries to the touch in a couple of hours, but it doesn't fully cure for a few weeks. If you paint the bottoms of your shelves one day, then put your dishes back in them a day or two later, you can almost be assured that some of the paint will stick to the bottoms of the dishes.

Develop a Color Scheme

If you want to use several colors in your refinishing project, you can take a clue from how Doug developed his color scheme in this episode. The homeowner conveniently left a magazine open to a photograph as a "hint" to her neighbors and their designer. Doug found a painted candleholder that included all of the tropical colors he decided to use. Home decorating magazines are a great source of inspiration for mixing and matching colors. Paint stores are another one. They are usually full of brochures and pamphlets containing all kinds of ideas on how to coordinate colors. In most cases, you will want to choose a primary color, and then add one or two accent colors.